Broken Dreams, Broken Future
by Tainted Elf
Summary: Ever since the face off between Harry Potter and Voldemort the wizarding world has lived in terror. A long seven months have passed as Hogwarts' Golden Boy remains locked up in Azkaban. Once he is retrieved, is there any hope left in defeating Voldemort o


Broken Dreams, Broken Future

Prologue

Harry opened the picture book and tears streamed down his face. Inside lay pictures of his parents, and even some of him as an infant... But it wasn't the same. He remember how he'd watched them move with fascination when he'd first recieved the book. Now... He closed his eyes to mask the pain but tears continued to cascade down his filthy cheeks, leaving a line where the dirt had been washed away. He prodded the pictures with his wand, begging them to move. How could this happen? What had he done? 

The lock on his cell clanked, the guards were tormenting him again no doubt. Standing up, his face came in to the light. The once vivacious and vibrant visage of Harry Potter had been reduced to the pale and pitiful face that blended in with every other prisoner of Azkaban Prison. He shivered, hoping it was a wizard guard and not a dementor, or maybe even a visitor... Just not a dementor. His mind flashed back to his third year, watching Sirius nearly killed by the kiss of the Dementors. Now, Harry was doomed to meet the same fate. He shook the book in his hands, pleading for the pictures to move again. The picture of the old Order had Sirius in it, his only remembrance of his Godfather.

The door to his cell was opened and he shrank in to the corner. Whimpers escaped the throat of a boy who's tongue had once held no reserve when face to face with the Dark Lord himself. Lord Voldemort, that's who had started this. How dare he! Harry shivered, waiting anxiously to see who the visitor was. "Mr. Potter," the familiar voice made him shudder further.

A Death Eater, one he had come to despise, but tolerate, his seven years at Hogwarts. "Severus," he greeted with a hoarse and frightened voice.

"What have they done to you, Mr. Potter?" He shook his head. "Come on, get up."

Harry stood weakly, "What good is it, Sir?"

Severus frowned, "Don't be so melodramatic. I'm simply here because I'm the only one who Voldemort would allow in to his prison."

"He survived then?" He sounded disappointed.

"Of course he did, Potter, how else would you end up here?" He shoved a vial towards Harry, who promptly drank it.

Harry looked up at him before the walls and floor started moving. He was dizzy and weak, and suddenly very small. When Severus held out a hand, Harry could actually fit on it. He could smell the sweat on his palm, he was nervous. "What'd you do to me!" He couldn't even understand the words coming out of his mouth, they sounded like squeaks. Hell, they were!

Severus patted him on the head, "Quite down." He was lost among the folds of his robes, in a pocket no doubt. The fabric smelled stale and dirty, much like he thought the Potion's Master to be. There were bits of lint in the corners that bothered his whiskers, WHISKERS! Harry squeaked a few more times until Severus's rather large hand batted him again through the cloth. He was silent.

It seemed like hours before he saw daylight again, he'd calmed down and spent the passing time trying to figure out what was going on. Was he being saved? Severus pulled him out and set him on a cold slab, a table maybe... A moment later he found himself sitting in the middle of the dark dungeons of Hogwarts, the Potion's room to be more precise. Even in the dim and dreary light of the dank and unkempt room, Harry's eyes burned. It'd been almost a year since he'd seen sunlight, even diluted through the drapes as it was now.

"Harry?" He noticed people around him and curled up on the table. Who were they? His eyes couldn't focus clearly.

A female voice spoke, "Good God, Severus, what has happened to him?"

Severus, he knew Severus. He sighed, "I'm not sure Minerva. Whatever the Dark Lord did to him, he did it well. D'you think Albus can summon Poppy?"

"I'll check," one of the dark blurs left the room.

"Why can't I see?" he hardly recognized his own voice. It was timid, hoarse and weak.

An exasperated sigh escaped the lips of his Potion's Master. "You've been in the dark for almost a year and you've been deprived of an visiual stimulation besides those who tormented you!"

It was true, his first two weeks had been horrid. He'd been locked in a room where you couldn't hear or see anything. Sensory deprivation is what he'd heard it called. Thanks to this torment, he could hardly ever fall asleep in Azkaban, as someone was always making noise somewhere. He looked down at the floor, tired and worn. "Can I go back to my room then?"

Severus raised a brow, "Mr. Potter, albeit your academic behavior as a student here made it appear that you owned this school, you do not and as such there is no room reserved for you since you graduated last year." He sighed, "It's March, Mr. Potter, class is still in session."

"Oh," was all Harry could manage to say. His eyes started to focus, he could see Snape's dark eyebrows and the outline of his eyes. That was pretty clear, right? He couldn't remember. For the sake of all that is magical, Harry Potter couldn't remember what it was like to see properly. He tried to digest what Snape has just told him, but he couldn't. His head was throbbing and he was exhausted. "Can I sleep here?"

"In the middle of the classroom?" Snape began to sound even more exasperated. Luckily, Poppy chose that moment to make her entrance. Smiling softly and bustling over to Harry, she looked at his eyes and complexion, inside his mouth and ears and sighed.

She shook her head, "I'm afraid they did a good job on Mr. Potter here, he will have to be admitted to the infirmary if I am to correct all the damage. Some of it may even be irreparable. These bones have healed improperly, but to repair them I would have to break them again. It would be agonizing."

Harry laughed. His laughter, which had once been light-hearted and carefree was now sardonic and eerie. "Hurt? You're afraid it will hurt?" He chuckled darkly for a moment longer, "I'm sure the pain will be nothing compared to the torment the dementors forced upon for six months. The rape, the abuse, the psychological mind-games that the Death Eaters inflicted upon me? That might've been slightly worse, wouldn't you think so Madame Pomfrey?"

With a visage bordering alarm, Poppy nodded slowly. Luckily, Professor McGonagall decided to reply, as Poppy seemed to be at a loss for words. "Mr. Potter, please could you refrain from being so rude? You are no longer under this school's care and any aide Madame Pomfrey extends to you is strictly out of her own volition. What happened to you may be terrible, but it is no reason to treat a superior like this." She was watching him from above her glasses as she spoke.

He looked towards her, "Professor McGonagall, now I remember." She was his old Transfiguration professor. Where had his memory gone to? "Madame Pomfrey? Is she new here?"

Poppy shook her head, "Let's get you to bed, Mr. Potter."

---

Albus stood at the foot of Harry's bed with a deep frown on his face. "This isn't good, Minerva. If this is what they managed to do in seven months, I fear what they will do if they truly win this war."

"Don't talk like that, Albus," Minerva shook her head. "We mustn't lose hope. Mr. Potter needs us more now than he ever has before."

He shook his head, "If he can recall who we even are..."

---End Prologue---

Well? Does it have enough potential to continue? I'm not sure... Tell me what you think.


End file.
